At 13, skater is enjoying the ride

NATIONAL CITY  Cory Juneau doesn’t think he has a style, he doesn’t train and he doesn’t pursue endorsements or sponsorships, but the 13-year-old’s love of skating has already won him the most prestigious global title for amateurs.

He also has a few sponsorships under his trucks.

The National City home-schooler soared to first place in the 2013 Vans Amateur Combi Classic for his age group in March, and took third in the contest for skaters 15 and older.

Cory has a love and aptitude for anything with wheels on it, said his dad, Kirk Juneau. But the “little man,” as teammates call him, also has a passion for the sport so innate that he doesn’t feel it’s extraordinary.

“Skateboarding is kind of my life,” Cory said with a shrug.

Kirk said he supports Cory, but that he’s trying to “keep it real” by letting Cory pursue it with his own level of commitment, rather than pushing his son into stardom.

“Cory’s one of the few people who earned his way up,” Kirk said, explaining that many skaters receive their early sponsorships through friends or acquaintances. Cory has gotten his after competitions in which he didn’t necessarily place first. More often than not, Kirk said, a representative would follow the disappointed grom to his car and ask him to skate for Revelation, Sector Nine, or most recently, Creature Skateboards.

Cory also started small, with the Salvation Army Kroc Center skate park down the street from his old house in La Mesa; then moved up to medium-sized parks, and eventually took on skate parks in Mission Valley, Encinitas and even Orange County.

“What he is leaving behind him is a legacy, because he’s not a flash in the pan,” Kirk said. “He’s proved himself at the lower levels and built his way up to where he is now. He went through it all.”

He now competes on Creature’s team, which Kirk described as “the gnarliest team out there, seriously throwing down legit skateboarding without the hype.”

It’s a good fit for a kid who likes his independence and doesn’t like pressure. He doesn’t have a coach and skates alone most of the time. He also doesn’t train, per se.

Kirk said he worries that too much training and focus on competition would snuff out Cory’s passion.

His routine involves traveling the 17 miles to his “home” at the Mission Valley YMCA Krause Family Skate/Bike Park almost daily, and practicing new tricks and lines.

It also helps that falling and injuries don’t faze Cory.

“You can’t skate and not fall,” he explained, one foot on a board teetering over the pool coping at the park. “It’s not possible. It happens.”

He fell a couple times demonstrating some of his tricks, because he was skating on an injured knee.

He has broken his wrist twice, his ankle once, torn his ACL, and hurt himself another dozen or so times without breaking anything.

“It’s not that many for six years,” he said.

Not training and embracing the inevitable appear to work for Juneau.

“He is one of the kings of the massive airs,” wrote Xavier Lannes on the blog I Skate, Therefore I Am, in a post recapping the Vans Am Combi this year. “Cory was absolutely amazing last year, when only he and Austin Poynter could fly at unimaginable heights.”

This year, the blogger said, Cory’s power and structure raised the bar for the younger generation.

Instead of returning to the Vans Am Combi, Cory is taking a break from competition to give other young groms a shot at the limelight.

His two-year hiatus may involve some touring, and definitely practicing for his pro debut at 16 years old.